GACKT's 44th BIRTHDAY PARTY
I wanted to write this earlier, but I was waiting for some pro-shot photos from the event. It’s now three days later and we still don’t have any, so I’m not going to wait any longer. I didn’t make notes of the parties so I’m doing everything from memory. I’ve undoubtedly forgot things, and maybe misremembered some others, but I’ve done my best!
GACKT’s 44th BIRTHDAY PARTY was held on July 4th in the banquet hall at the Grand Prince Hotel New Takanawa in Shinagawa, Tokyo. This was the same location as FNS Kayousai last December, where GACKT teamed up with TM Revolution to sing 12 Gatsu no Love Song.
Before entering the actual hall where the event was to take place, there were a few things to look at and do. There were two life sized cut outs of GACKT to take photos with - one with him wearing the white suit from the birthday goods, and the other with the black suit.
You could browse through and buy the birthday goods, although other than the bromides you couldn’t actually pick up the goods at the venue, and had to instead order them to be delivered later.
At the back, there was a mock casino set up with several tables, where dealers and other poker experts would help the fans through a poker game, thanks to handouts and instructions.
In this casino area, a couple of screens were playing the poker show that GACKT recorded recently, and there was even a Bounty Killer pachinko machine from 2008!
Bounty Killer!
Flowers had been sent by SQF, Skiyaki (the company that manages GACKT’s website and fanclub), several fans (including Oh GACKT You Didn’t!) and of course, GACKT’s biggest fanboy, Seito Kaicho.
From Seito Kaicho
I'm so glad these arrived safely!
The doors to the main hall opened basically on time for both events, and Bolero was played until the food was served.
From GACKT's blog
At the dinner event there were 68 tables seating 8 each, so there were about 540 people there. Lunch time was similar numbers. While the food was being served, the LVL DVD was played instead from the start until the end of Mirror. Both lunch and dinner were themed four course menus, with each course named after one of GACKT’s songs.
Lunch table setting
Lunch meals
Dinner table setting
Dinner meals
Menus
After the food finished and before the talk show started, it was back to Bolero again.
The Talk Event
Shinnosu was the MC for both events, and he greeted the crowd from the stage and welcomed everyone to the event. He then introduced the members of GACKTJOB that would make up the panel. Everyone entered through the same door in the corner of the hall, and walked through the middle of the crowd to get to the stage.
The panel were-
Hiroki (known as Rassan during Gakuensai), You-suke, Tac, Hagi-chan, Madoka, Hayato, Val, Sato, Takumi, YOU and Chachamaru.
It was basically the same line-up as Gakuensai, only with Tac, who was a dancer for the LAST VISUALIVE in place of Tennen, and with extra, added Chacha. Some of the panel changed shirts and ties between the two events, and others wore the same outfits.
The last person to be announced was GACKT, and he also came through the crowd. For both events he wore black suits, and matched them with his sparkly ties, one in silver and one in gold. GACKT said that he was happy that Chacha was there, and then insulted Chacha’s hair and suit. After GACKT joined the stage and said hello to everyone, the first game began.
There were three games in total and they were the same for both the lunch and dinner events. In both events, the fans in attendance were asked to choose the GACKTJOB member that they thought would win, and the tables that picked the winners would win a GACKT photocard. At the lunch event, it wasn’t really clear that there were two chances to win and everyone was only asked to pick one member, but at the dinner event it was better organized and the two chances were kept distinct from each other.
Game 1 - GACKTJOB jukebox
One member of GACKTJOB had to listen to a GACKT song via earphones, and then sing it to the rest of the panel. The first person to guess correctly would get 100 points, and GACKT would score the person doing the singing. The catch was, that the singer couldn’t use the actual song lyrics, and instead had to sing whatever short phrase GACKT picked for them.
This was surprisingly difficult because they mainly picked panel members that can’t sing (Madoka, Val, Takumi etc), and without either the correct tune or lyrics it’s hard to tell! Also, all of the tracks picked were album tracks, such as Asrun Dream, Kalmia and Justified, and not the big hits you immediately think of.
YOU was pretty good at this during the lunch, but everyone failed at the dinner event. Even GACKT couldn’t recognise most of the songs. Madoka was especially awful at singing the songs, but he was also hamming it up a lot and being purposely awful.
At both the lunch and the dinner events, Madoka was so awful that he entertained GACKT into giving him the most points, so he was the winner both times. Any tables that picked Madoka could get the photocards.
Game 2 - GACKT’s Foreign Language Course
Shinnosu explained that GACKT can speak several languages, so for this game GACKT would say a sentence in a foreign language, and the panel had to say what it sounds like in Japanese. They didn’t have to translate the sentence, just listen carefully and figure out what it sounds like. It was kinda like that part in Vanilla where GACKT used to sing “A crew sees crying knees / I wanna need. Not betray!” in English and it seems like it’s nonsense, but he’s only singing it because it sounds really similar to the Japanese line “kurashii kurai ni, wana ni nabite” (and if you look at the lyrics of the BEST OF THE BEST version, the English line has actually been replaced by that Japanese line now).
Anyway... getting off topic there!
GACKT had his phone with him, and must have had audio of the sentences on it as he was seemingly listening to audio of them and practicing them off mic before he had to say them. All of the sentences were about different members of GACKTJOB. I don’t remember most of the sentences, but there was one about You-suke being an ugly gorilla, one about waking YOU up because he’s old or something… The only sentence I do remember fully, is the first one that was meant to be “It’s so dark that I can’t see Madoka.” Guessing these correctly were mainly group efforts, as one panel member would pick up a few words, and then another panel member would build on that until they got the sentence.
Game 3 - GACKTJOB Kakuzuke Check
For this game, the panel competed in teams. The teams were Sato and Madoka, YOU and Chacha, Takumi and Hayato, Val and Hiroki, Tac and You-Suke, and Hagi-chan was a team on his own. Like the TV show, they were shown two items, and they had to choose the correct one, only this time it wasn’t the most expensive item and the criteria changed each time.
Every time a team got a question wrong, they would move down a level, from ‘First Class GACKTJOB’ down to ‘Kojima [Val] JOB’. Each drop in level would mean that they would have to change their pants too. One level down was this year’s Gakuensai drop crotch training wear, two levels down was shredded up running bottoms, three levels down was tight and cheap trousers, and the final level was granny pantie style male briefs. Some of the running bottoms were only slightly shredded, others had splits right up to the waist line. Val wore his Gakuensai bottoms with his suit jacket tucked inside, and Chacha just looked fabulous in everything.
The losers would also have to do a batsu game each time that was connected to the items.
For the dinner event, the fans were asked to choose what team they thought would win. At the lunch event, everyone just stuck with the pick they made during Game 1.
At both events, the first round involved identifying which liquid was tequila from a choice of two. The liquids were in colored glasses and inside a glass case, so nobody could see the proper color of the liquids or smell them. The choice at lunch was between tequila and ginger ale, and at dinner it was tequila and Spirytus (a very potent Polish vodka). Any teams that got it wrong, had to take a shot of tequila. Hagi-chan lost both times and had to take two shots both times too, because he was playing solo.
The other lunch challenges were
Clothes pegs - the members had to chose which one had the strongest grip (I think?) and the losers had the pegs attached to their ears and ripped off
Pens - one pen was normal, the other was a joke pen that gave an electric shock. The losers had to give themselves the shock
Noni juice - one of two glasses was noni juice. The losers had to drink it.
During the lunch event, Sato and Madoka were performing the best. Originally the last challenge was only going to be one level down too, but GACKT suggested that any team that failed the last challenge, should be pushed down to the lowest level. All of the teams got it wrong other than for Takumi and Hayato, so they were the winners. Everybody else had to wear the underwear.
So many thighs... (from GACKT's blog)
The other dinner challenges were
Elastic bands - if you’ve seen the NicoNico broadcast of this year’s Camui Gakuen, you’ll have seen YOU do a batsu game where he holds a thick strip of elastic between his teeth, it gets stretched, and then flung back in his face. It was that type of elastic, and the losers had to do the same batsu game
Candles - one was a regular candle, one was a candle specifically for dripping candle wax on people as part of S&M activities. Every one who lost had to have hot wax dripped on them by GACKT. Val was first, and at first he lay on the floor, but then stood up and rolled up his sleeve for the wax. Next were Tac and You-suke, and they both got on all fours and lifted up their shirts so GACKT could drip the wax onto their backs. YOU and Chacha both rolled up their sleeves, and YOU didn’t flinch at all at the wax. Finally was Hiroki. He put up a fight, so the other members grabbed him, opened up his shirt and held him so that GACKT could drip the wax over his chest and stomach.
Hot sauce - I can’t remember what type of sauce it was, but it was very hot! Losers had the sauce smeared over their mouths. GACKT was interested in how spicy the sauce was, and dipped his little finger in it so he could eat it from his finger. GACKT agreed it was spicy, and spent quite some time wiping off his finger after that!
Again, the winners of the contest were Takumi and Hayato, as they had a perfect record this time!
GACKT did not get a perfect record, and was about 50/50 on the ones he answered. He wasn’t playing though, so it was okay! GACKT was asked to chose the worst performer and for lunch he chose Sato, and at dinner Hayato. Hayato wasn’t pleased because as he pointed out, his team got everything right at the dinner. The batsu game for this was just to stand out in the lobby and greet all of the fans.
Birthday celebrations
At both events YOU and Chacha ran off stage to get the cakes. Everyone wished GACKT a happy birthday, and he blew out the candles.
At lunchtime, video messages to GACKT were shown from Takayuki Yamada and Golden Bomber.
At dinnertime the messages were from Takashi Tsukamoto and Yoshiki.
After the messages, Hayato introduced a present from GACKTJOB to GACKT, as all of the GACKTJOB members took it in turns to sing a song for GACKT. The lunchtime song was LOVE LETTER, the dinnertime song was DEARS. Some of the panel can sing (Hayato and Chacha), some are passable (YOU, Sato) and others are awful. GACKT found all of this very funny and was especially amused when Sato stepped forward to start the songs. Both times, GACKT was asked to finish the song, and he sang the last chorus lines.
When GACKT gave his message to the fans at the lunchtime show, he said how strange the photos were going to look in the media because almost everyone was stood with bare legs and big underwear. Shinnosu pointed out that because GACKT was stood behind the cake table, people would think that GACKT was also wearing just the underwear. GACKT very quickly ran out from behind the table complaining at that idea!
And that was about it! GACKT left first, followed by the panel and finally Shinnosu. The cakes were put out in the lobby for photos, any tables that picked the winning GACKTJOB members could get their prizes, and everyone could go and say hello to either Sato or Hayato.
Lunch cake
Dinner cake
The events were a lot of fun! Things overran slightly, but not massively so, so kudos to Shinnosu for being a great MC and keeping everything running well!
GACKT’s 44th BIRTHDAY PARTY was held on July 4th in the banquet hall at the Grand Prince Hotel New Takanawa in Shinagawa, Tokyo. This was the same location as FNS Kayousai last December, where GACKT teamed up with TM Revolution to sing 12 Gatsu no Love Song.
Before entering the actual hall where the event was to take place, there were a few things to look at and do. There were two life sized cut outs of GACKT to take photos with - one with him wearing the white suit from the birthday goods, and the other with the black suit.
You could browse through and buy the birthday goods, although other than the bromides you couldn’t actually pick up the goods at the venue, and had to instead order them to be delivered later.
At the back, there was a mock casino set up with several tables, where dealers and other poker experts would help the fans through a poker game, thanks to handouts and instructions.
In this casino area, a couple of screens were playing the poker show that GACKT recorded recently, and there was even a Bounty Killer pachinko machine from 2008!
Bounty Killer!
Flowers had been sent by SQF, Skiyaki (the company that manages GACKT’s website and fanclub), several fans (including Oh GACKT You Didn’t!) and of course, GACKT’s biggest fanboy, Seito Kaicho.
From Seito Kaicho
I'm so glad these arrived safely!
The doors to the main hall opened basically on time for both events, and Bolero was played until the food was served.
From GACKT's blog
At the dinner event there were 68 tables seating 8 each, so there were about 540 people there. Lunch time was similar numbers. While the food was being served, the LVL DVD was played instead from the start until the end of Mirror. Both lunch and dinner were themed four course menus, with each course named after one of GACKT’s songs.
Lunch table setting
Lunch meals
Dinner table setting
Dinner meals
Menus
After the food finished and before the talk show started, it was back to Bolero again.
The Talk Event
Shinnosu was the MC for both events, and he greeted the crowd from the stage and welcomed everyone to the event. He then introduced the members of GACKTJOB that would make up the panel. Everyone entered through the same door in the corner of the hall, and walked through the middle of the crowd to get to the stage.
The panel were-
Hiroki (known as Rassan during Gakuensai), You-suke, Tac, Hagi-chan, Madoka, Hayato, Val, Sato, Takumi, YOU and Chachamaru.
It was basically the same line-up as Gakuensai, only with Tac, who was a dancer for the LAST VISUALIVE in place of Tennen, and with extra, added Chacha. Some of the panel changed shirts and ties between the two events, and others wore the same outfits.
The last person to be announced was GACKT, and he also came through the crowd. For both events he wore black suits, and matched them with his sparkly ties, one in silver and one in gold. GACKT said that he was happy that Chacha was there, and then insulted Chacha’s hair and suit. After GACKT joined the stage and said hello to everyone, the first game began.
There were three games in total and they were the same for both the lunch and dinner events. In both events, the fans in attendance were asked to choose the GACKTJOB member that they thought would win, and the tables that picked the winners would win a GACKT photocard. At the lunch event, it wasn’t really clear that there were two chances to win and everyone was only asked to pick one member, but at the dinner event it was better organized and the two chances were kept distinct from each other.
Game 1 - GACKTJOB jukebox
One member of GACKTJOB had to listen to a GACKT song via earphones, and then sing it to the rest of the panel. The first person to guess correctly would get 100 points, and GACKT would score the person doing the singing. The catch was, that the singer couldn’t use the actual song lyrics, and instead had to sing whatever short phrase GACKT picked for them.
This was surprisingly difficult because they mainly picked panel members that can’t sing (Madoka, Val, Takumi etc), and without either the correct tune or lyrics it’s hard to tell! Also, all of the tracks picked were album tracks, such as Asrun Dream, Kalmia and Justified, and not the big hits you immediately think of.
YOU was pretty good at this during the lunch, but everyone failed at the dinner event. Even GACKT couldn’t recognise most of the songs. Madoka was especially awful at singing the songs, but he was also hamming it up a lot and being purposely awful.
At both the lunch and the dinner events, Madoka was so awful that he entertained GACKT into giving him the most points, so he was the winner both times. Any tables that picked Madoka could get the photocards.
Game 2 - GACKT’s Foreign Language Course
Shinnosu explained that GACKT can speak several languages, so for this game GACKT would say a sentence in a foreign language, and the panel had to say what it sounds like in Japanese. They didn’t have to translate the sentence, just listen carefully and figure out what it sounds like. It was kinda like that part in Vanilla where GACKT used to sing “A crew sees crying knees / I wanna need. Not betray!” in English and it seems like it’s nonsense, but he’s only singing it because it sounds really similar to the Japanese line “kurashii kurai ni, wana ni nabite” (and if you look at the lyrics of the BEST OF THE BEST version, the English line has actually been replaced by that Japanese line now).
Anyway... getting off topic there!
GACKT had his phone with him, and must have had audio of the sentences on it as he was seemingly listening to audio of them and practicing them off mic before he had to say them. All of the sentences were about different members of GACKTJOB. I don’t remember most of the sentences, but there was one about You-suke being an ugly gorilla, one about waking YOU up because he’s old or something… The only sentence I do remember fully, is the first one that was meant to be “It’s so dark that I can’t see Madoka.” Guessing these correctly were mainly group efforts, as one panel member would pick up a few words, and then another panel member would build on that until they got the sentence.
Game 3 - GACKTJOB Kakuzuke Check
For this game, the panel competed in teams. The teams were Sato and Madoka, YOU and Chacha, Takumi and Hayato, Val and Hiroki, Tac and You-Suke, and Hagi-chan was a team on his own. Like the TV show, they were shown two items, and they had to choose the correct one, only this time it wasn’t the most expensive item and the criteria changed each time.
Every time a team got a question wrong, they would move down a level, from ‘First Class GACKTJOB’ down to ‘Kojima [Val] JOB’. Each drop in level would mean that they would have to change their pants too. One level down was this year’s Gakuensai drop crotch training wear, two levels down was shredded up running bottoms, three levels down was tight and cheap trousers, and the final level was granny pantie style male briefs. Some of the running bottoms were only slightly shredded, others had splits right up to the waist line. Val wore his Gakuensai bottoms with his suit jacket tucked inside, and Chacha just looked fabulous in everything.
The losers would also have to do a batsu game each time that was connected to the items.
For the dinner event, the fans were asked to choose what team they thought would win. At the lunch event, everyone just stuck with the pick they made during Game 1.
At both events, the first round involved identifying which liquid was tequila from a choice of two. The liquids were in colored glasses and inside a glass case, so nobody could see the proper color of the liquids or smell them. The choice at lunch was between tequila and ginger ale, and at dinner it was tequila and Spirytus (a very potent Polish vodka). Any teams that got it wrong, had to take a shot of tequila. Hagi-chan lost both times and had to take two shots both times too, because he was playing solo.
The other lunch challenges were
Clothes pegs - the members had to chose which one had the strongest grip (I think?) and the losers had the pegs attached to their ears and ripped off
Pens - one pen was normal, the other was a joke pen that gave an electric shock. The losers had to give themselves the shock
Noni juice - one of two glasses was noni juice. The losers had to drink it.
During the lunch event, Sato and Madoka were performing the best. Originally the last challenge was only going to be one level down too, but GACKT suggested that any team that failed the last challenge, should be pushed down to the lowest level. All of the teams got it wrong other than for Takumi and Hayato, so they were the winners. Everybody else had to wear the underwear.
So many thighs... (from GACKT's blog)
The other dinner challenges were
Elastic bands - if you’ve seen the NicoNico broadcast of this year’s Camui Gakuen, you’ll have seen YOU do a batsu game where he holds a thick strip of elastic between his teeth, it gets stretched, and then flung back in his face. It was that type of elastic, and the losers had to do the same batsu game
Candles - one was a regular candle, one was a candle specifically for dripping candle wax on people as part of S&M activities. Every one who lost had to have hot wax dripped on them by GACKT. Val was first, and at first he lay on the floor, but then stood up and rolled up his sleeve for the wax. Next were Tac and You-suke, and they both got on all fours and lifted up their shirts so GACKT could drip the wax onto their backs. YOU and Chacha both rolled up their sleeves, and YOU didn’t flinch at all at the wax. Finally was Hiroki. He put up a fight, so the other members grabbed him, opened up his shirt and held him so that GACKT could drip the wax over his chest and stomach.
Hot sauce - I can’t remember what type of sauce it was, but it was very hot! Losers had the sauce smeared over their mouths. GACKT was interested in how spicy the sauce was, and dipped his little finger in it so he could eat it from his finger. GACKT agreed it was spicy, and spent quite some time wiping off his finger after that!
Again, the winners of the contest were Takumi and Hayato, as they had a perfect record this time!
GACKT did not get a perfect record, and was about 50/50 on the ones he answered. He wasn’t playing though, so it was okay! GACKT was asked to chose the worst performer and for lunch he chose Sato, and at dinner Hayato. Hayato wasn’t pleased because as he pointed out, his team got everything right at the dinner. The batsu game for this was just to stand out in the lobby and greet all of the fans.
Birthday celebrations
At both events YOU and Chacha ran off stage to get the cakes. Everyone wished GACKT a happy birthday, and he blew out the candles.
At lunchtime, video messages to GACKT were shown from Takayuki Yamada and Golden Bomber.
At dinnertime the messages were from Takashi Tsukamoto and Yoshiki.
After the messages, Hayato introduced a present from GACKTJOB to GACKT, as all of the GACKTJOB members took it in turns to sing a song for GACKT. The lunchtime song was LOVE LETTER, the dinnertime song was DEARS. Some of the panel can sing (Hayato and Chacha), some are passable (YOU, Sato) and others are awful. GACKT found all of this very funny and was especially amused when Sato stepped forward to start the songs. Both times, GACKT was asked to finish the song, and he sang the last chorus lines.
When GACKT gave his message to the fans at the lunchtime show, he said how strange the photos were going to look in the media because almost everyone was stood with bare legs and big underwear. Shinnosu pointed out that because GACKT was stood behind the cake table, people would think that GACKT was also wearing just the underwear. GACKT very quickly ran out from behind the table complaining at that idea!
And that was about it! GACKT left first, followed by the panel and finally Shinnosu. The cakes were put out in the lobby for photos, any tables that picked the winning GACKTJOB members could get their prizes, and everyone could go and say hello to either Sato or Hayato.
Lunch cake
Dinner cake
The events were a lot of fun! Things overran slightly, but not massively so, so kudos to Shinnosu for being a great MC and keeping everything running well!